Fun Poe facts:

  • Poe is considered the inventor of the modern detective story, emulated masterfully by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and the Edgar Award is given to mystery writers each year.

  • He married his cousin Virginia Clemm when he was 26 and she was 13.

  • The Baltimore Ravens football team was named for his poem "The Raven."

  • Although "The Raven" was a huge hit, Poe only earned $14 for it.

  • His death remains a mystery. He was found in a Baltimore gutter, dressed in someone else's clothes, in a delirious state. Theories posited to explain his death include:

    • Rabies

    • Rare brain disease

    • Syphilis

    • Alcohol poisoning

    • Diabetes

    • A scheme involving being kidnapped, drugged, and used as a repeat voter in ballot-stuffing fraud

  • Each year since 1949, the 100th anniversary of the year of Poe's death, on Poe's birthday, a mysterious visitor known as the Poe Toaster leaves a half-empty bottle of Martel cognac and three roses on this grave. The roses are assumed to represent Poe, his wife Virginia, and her mother, Maria Clemm




Vocabulary

Foresight: Thoughtful regard for the future

Dissimulation: false appearances

Vexed: Troubled, distressed, caused agitation

Sagacity: Sound judgment; wisdom

Hearkening: Giving careful attention

Awe: A mixed feeling of reverence, fear, and wonder

Over-acuteness: over-keenness

Concealment: A means of hiding

Waned: grown gradually less

Scantlings: Small quantities or amounts

Suavity: Gracefulness, politeness

Bade: Urged, compelled

Audacity: Bold courage, daring

Reposed: laid at rest

Derision: Contempt, ridicule



Consider the following:

  1. How does Poe create suspense?
  2. Can you find examples of irony?
  3. Can you map out the plot: rising action, climax, denouement?
  4. Discuss the point of view of this story. What do we know about our narrator?
  5. How does Poe create a mood?